Merchant Archive
Thread: Focus Thread: Galaxy-Wide Vendor Search
I'm sorry but if you don't participate you won't get any sales. Everyone will line up at the bazaar and you will either publish there or be left out. Its not optional it only appears that way.
The optional switch will only be useful for those who are selling to guildmates or friends only or for custom pickups. Anyone trying to to sell to the public will be forced to list them where everyone is looking.
AlaManQ5 wrote:
ahem...
It is Optional!!!!
We understand this, but do you understand the effect of not being seen to the majority of buyers? I gain so much business because my tailor shop is in a player city outside Theed and people searching for a tailor find me. They come to my shop tobuy one or two items and end up purchasing more.
It's a deathblow.
QFE
And think of how great it will be that everyone no longer travels to your shop,
that only the lowest sellers get sales
that the impulse buys from browseing a vendor are gone
that player cities that are clinging to exist via their vendors are no longer visited...
Message Edited by Kaasi on 02-11-2005 03:06 PM
Message Edited by Kaasi on 02-11-2005 03:08 PM
AlaManQ5 wrote:Greed.Plain and simple.That's what its all about.My one-star rating proves it.All for a VIRTUAL dollar...it is to laugh...
Actually I suspect your one star was for the excessively large font you originally used (no, it wasn't me who one-starred you). Thanks for changing it. As for the issue being greed? I disagree. It's certainly not in my case. I'm a Droid Engineer. I'm the cheapest Droid Engineer I know of on Infinity. By a long long long way. I can provide you with a waypoint to my store if you don't believe me. I posted the reasons for my low prices earlier in this thread. I don't believe I can be accused of being greedy. My issue with this problem is it make my home planet, a planet I feel attached to, useless.
I suspect most of the others have an issue with this change not because of greed, but because it removes any element of skill from being a merchant. Location, size, availability, customer relations and displays have all gone out of the window. Now the only issues are quality (a crafter issue, not a merchant issue) and price. Many people rightly feel a sense of pride in the businesses that they have built up through hard work and cunning. They are reacting to this change because it will make all that hard work worthless.
EnigmaBSc
Phaelyn wrote:I keep seeing people referring to the Bazaar in relation to this change. Please go back and read carefully - The bazaar isn't the system changed - our VENDORS are.
Galaxy-wide Vendor Search:
We have enhanced the functionality of our bazaar terminals to include the ability to search all player vendors for items you may be looking for.
EnigmaBSc
AlaManQ5 wrote:
Greed.
Plain and simple.
That's what its all about.
No, it's about protecting multiple playstyles in the game. If crafting weren't important, we'd just buy stuff from NPCs instead of crafters. But when they designed the game, they decided it was important for the game to have multiple playstyles. In particular, there are three primary playstyles - combat, crafter, entertainer. There are also several secondary (by my estimation - this isn't meant to slight anyone who considers these the main reason for playing) playstyles, including merchant, slicer, buffer, and probably several others I am forgetting.
The point of my post, and the posts of many others is not really about protecting profits, but about protecting our playstyle. This change simply kills merchant. It is also my opinion that this will kill crafting as well, except for the mega crafters and the few places where personal service will still matter (custom weapons, custom ship components, etc).
There is no question that making the game more fun is important. But it can't come at the expense of the playstyles. I think finding a slicer anymore is incredibly frustrating. But that doesn't mean I wanted craftable slicing kits used by anyone. I think finidng an at keyboard entertainer can be difficult. But that doesn't mean that I don't support the entertainer profession efforts to discourage afk entertaining. Ultimately, if we want this game to be a vibrant, multi-player game, we need to protect these professions. If the game is supposed to be about combat only, I might as well be playig a different online game that does combat better.
EnigmaBSc wrote:
Phaelyn wrote:
I keep seeing people referring to the Bazaar in relation to this change. Please go back and read carefully - The bazaar isn't the system changed - our VENDORS are.
Look at the Overview of functions:
Galaxy-wide Vendor Search:
We have enhanced the functionality of our bazaar terminals to include the ability to search all player vendors for items you may be looking for.
Overview
The purpose of vendor search function is to allow vendor owned items to be searched and bought from anywhere in the galaxy. This will include the following functions:
- Each vendor owner can decide whether to allow his or her vendors to be searchable in the market. There is an option for vendor owners to turn on/off the search option on his or her vendor. The vendor owner will be able to find current search option settings for each of his or her vendor(s)
- When a vendor owner turns on the search option, a player should be able to go to any vendor or bazaarand list all items owned by this vendor
- When a vendor owner turns off the search option, the vendor is no longer listed in the galaxy-wide network search. With this search option turned off, vendor owners have the ability to conduct private auctions. Players will need to physically go to the vendor and click "Use Vendor" to list items from this vendor.
- When a player lists items with the search filter he or she chooses, he or she will be able to buy any of the items listed, even if the item is owned by a remote vendor
As I said, if it was just the Bazaar, it's pure competition - If you use MY vendor to buy someone else's goods, *I* should get at least a "finder's fee"
Message Edited by Phaelyn on 02-11-2005 06:07 PM
Can people buy something in a shop for 5000 credits less then the "market" price... drive to the vendor out in FiveKMFromNowhere Talus and then get hit with a 20k entrance fee to retrieve their item? Sounds like real bad news to me.
What about the lowering of Merch XP gained from 1credit entry fees from people browsing your shop right near theed if the amount of people browsing gets lowered.
EnigmaBSc wrote:
I suspect most of the others have an issue with this change not because of greed, but because it removes any element of skill from being a merchant. Location, size, availability, customer relations and displays have all gone out of the window. Now the only issues are quality (a crafter issue, not a merchant issue) and price. Many people rightly feel a sense of pride in the businesses that they have built up through hard work and cunning. They are reacting to this change because it will make all that hard work worthless.
EnigmaBSc
